Anthologies Tales from the Front Lines
by IronAmerica
Summary: A collection of short stories based around my main characeter from Tabula Rasa. Will deal with MATURE themes, or at least themes that require a certain level of maturity. Rating subject to change.


_Five Minutes, Chase Bashir-_

Five minutes.

It's funny, now that I think about it. Five years ago, all I wanted was to make it to the weekend so I could veg out in front of the TV. Now all I want is five minutes. Is that too much to ask for?

Five minutes, to be totally bored out of my skull.

I never thought that I would miss school, you know. I don't think any of us here would ever miss something like that.

Now, all of us wade knee deep through blood, gore, limbs. Some of it is ours, some of it is theirs. Who knows anymore? In death, everyone is the same. All the time, we have to be on the move, to the next front line, or a field hospital so that we can go back to the front lines.

I don't think that asking for five minutes to myself is so that bad. There is so much death these days. I saw a machina yesterday; it had a face like my mother's.

I shot it off.

It bothers me some days, I think, that I cannot feel anything anymore. Captain Young tells me it'll pass, but it still bothers me.

My mother always told me that our ability to feel emotions- guilt, happiness, etc. - was the only thing that separated us from the Bane. It was our emotions that made us human. Sometimes I wonder if we are not becoming more like them everyday.

I just want five minutes to myself.

Sometimes, I think the Corman's were right. What point is there to all this fighting? We only lose ourselves in all of the blood and the death. I will never get that smell out of my clothes, out of my hair, out of my skin.

A small part of me wants to join the Cormans, then I see another casualty come into the base camp, and I wade back into the river of blood to kill the scum-sucking Crusty that did it.

If there is anything I have learned on Foreas, it is that I will never be able to sleep peacefully anymore. There will always be a macabre parade of the dead - those that I killed, parading themselves in front of me when I close my eyes.

When my mother and I came to Foreas via the wormhole, she changed our last name to Bashir. I think he was some sort of doctor, judging from mom's description. I wonder if he was my dad. I've never met my dad, so it might be possible.

I wonder if he would say the same thing to me. Would he tell me that emotions are what make us human? Or would he be like the people here, that get off on the fighting? I wonder if he would ask for five minutes to himself. Would he cry, or would he just shoulder a gun and wade into the sea of blood, like everyone else? Like I do.

I think that I lost my dreams a long time ago. Mom said that I used to have stars in my eyes. Now all I can see are black pits with no hope in them. Do all of us look like that?

I chase everything, just like my name says. Commando Chase Bashir, guardian hopeful. I don't have stars in my eyes anymore.

I want to sleep for five minutes.

Can I have five minutes to myself?

_Home, Chase Bashir-_

Home. Such a simple word. One syllable, four letters, and so much meaning.

Foreas is not home. It never was, and I do not see myself calling it home anytime soon.

Home is Sequim, Washington. I always loved the mornings in Sequim. On a clear morning, you could see all the way to Vancouver Island from the porch. With binoculars, admittedly.

Nevertheless, it was still the best part. I loved to spot the Empress Hotel, and the Parliament building. My mom thought I was one of the strangest kids in Sequim. We loved each other anyways.

When the Bane invaded, we never really thought that they would come to our hometown. We barely had 6000 residents. We were tiny, and unimportant.

Sequim was home, and that is all that mattered to me. I was nine, and I had to take up a shotgun to drive off the Bane. I did that for my home.

What does home mean to you?

What would you do for your home?

Would you do what I did?

Would you kill to protect your home?

I did, and I will do it again. We had to evacuate earth, but we will be back, kickin' Crusties butt all the way. I will do my share, and I will get my share. I want to go back to the place that I love.

Where is home, but the place that your heart resides in? Mine will always be in Washington, watching that fog roll away. I will always be holding that battered old pair of binoculars, looking for the Empress Hotel.

Sequim, Washington. A small town and it is my home.

Where is your home?

Was it like mine?

Will you defend it when the time comes?

Sequim, Washington, a small town that holds my heart. When we go back to earth, I am going to be right there, with a rifle on my back, ready to take it by storm.

Until I can, though, I have to live in a killing field. I hate this planet. There isn't any fog in the morning. I have a porch, occasionally. I have binoculars, although they're not the ones I grew up with. I can't see Vancouver Island or the Empress Hotel anymore. All I can see is a sea of blood.

There isn't any fog in the morning here. There never is. Back home, I could see the man on the moon. Here, I can see Arieki. It looks like the moon, with a grid work of blood and lights.

I miss earth sometimes. It's not as bad as it used to be, but it is lessening each day. I still have to go back. I have to go back to Sequim, Washington, and see the fog roll off in the morning. I have to know that Vancouver Island is still there.

I want to see the Vancouver Parliament building again, and I want to take a walk through the Empress Hotel. The crabs were good, I think.

Will you be there when we return?

Home.

_Hungry, Chase Bashir-_

Hunger is an ever-present part of life here. I can never remember a time that I wasn't hungry.

I often wonder if the smugglers are right. Are the officers really taking the rations shipped from the Divide? Those rations, at least a part of them, belong to us grunts. I have to wonder if the officers are cheating us out of our fair share.

Hunger. An ever-present gnawing feeling in my stomach. I find my self getting used to my stomach grumbling all the time. My mates in the barracks tell me to eat more than the ration bars in my pack, but… MREs? Are they serious?

The MREs could be used as effective ant-Bane weaponry. Hell, they should be classed as biohazard, and sent to the frontlines for the biological warfare specialists.

I know I shouldn't be fussy about what I eat, but I am. I would rather be shorter than I should be, and hungry, than sick all the time from the toxic mess hall food. I am five foot four if I am an inch, and I know I should be taller.

I'll stick with my height and being hungry though.

Sometimes, if I'm with a Forean patrol, they'll give me some of their food. It's not a lot, but it is still some of the best food I'll ever get. Some days, I have to wonder if I will end up dead from lack of food.

I really miss the Dungeness Crabs from Sequim. I get a smile- a genuine one- on my face when I remember eating them with my mom. I would be able to eat three of them by myself, and mom would just shake her head, laughing.

On Tuesdays, I will eat a little bit from the mess hall. They have Boragar on Tuesdays. The cooks will get a couple of Boragar from some of the patrols, and they'll have a big ol' barbecue, like they used to have on Earth.

But every other day of the week, I'm hungry.

Every other day of the week, I am eating ration bars that are probably months past the expiration date, and dreaming of all the Dungeness crab I can eat.

I hate being hungry.

I hate the mess hall food even more. Someone should shoot the chefs. Not the Tuesday guys those. They can make a mean barbecue. It's the one thing that I will eat from the mess hall.

I've been asking around, but the Foreans don't have any native animal that even comes close to a crab. There are some days that I really hate this planet. I hate everything on this planet, from the Thrax to the lack of crabs.

Antonio della Luce, my best friend, and sometimes bedmate, said that he do a naked tapdance in front of the Thrax at Pravus Research for a plate of his father's spaghetti.

I guess everyone is just as hungry for a taste of home as I am. Antonio says that when we get back to earth, he'll take me to Italy, and he'll personally make me the biggest plate of spaghetti that I'd ever lay eyes on.

I jokingly told him that if he did that, then I'd have to take him to Sequim, and treat him to some Dungeness crab.

Foreas doesn't have spaghetti, and it doesn't have crab. Until we get home, we'll have to make do.

I'm hungry.

_Love, Chase Bashir-_

Love.

One word, four letters, and a whole lot of meaning. Love is an emotion, one of the most powerful ones we humans can experience. So often, though, we lock it away, never to be seen or used.

A lot of the time it's easier to not love. Love can cause you pain, make it harder to do your job. Hatred, rage, and anger? Those are safe emotions.

Those three emotions can be controlled, directed safely.

But love? Love is unpredictable. Love is a wild horse. It can hurt you more than any physical wound ever could. I've seen too many broken hearts after raids. So many of us never come back from them, and their lovers are left behind.

I feel guilty, sometimes. I have Antonio della Luce.

I have a lover who isn't likely to die anytime soon. I love him for it, and at the same time resent him. He has a permanent post with the Cormans, a liaison or something, and I'm on the front lines half the time.

Who do you love?

Do you love them as much as I love Antonio?

He is a medic, all of twenty one years old. I am a soldier, who has no business being in a relationship with him. Back on earth, Antonio della Luce, my handsome lover, would have a line of women and men at his feet.

Yet he chooses to spend his time with me.

I love him, but does he truly love me back?

Is this a game to him? Is he in love with me, or am I to be cast aside when he is done?

I am fifteen. My barracks chief says that he will kill Medic della Luce the next time that he comes and spends the night. I worry that he will carry through with his threat.

How much do you love your partner or your spouse?

Would you breach the gates of hell for them?

Would you die for them?

I love Antonio Leonardo dell Luce so much that it is painful. I would go to hell for him. I would breach the very gates of hell to bring him home. I would die for Antonio, there is no doubt in my mind on that matter.

Does he love me?

Love. A feeling of intense desire and attraction toward a person with whom one is disposed to make a pair; the emotion of sex and romance. That was a definition I read once. It is the emotion that I direct towards my older lover.

Would you stay in a relationship, knowing that you may die the next day?

Will you die next to your lover, watching the life leave their eyes?

Yes, I would. I would stay in it, and I would die beside him.

We are slaves to our emotions, that much is true for every human. We are controlled by them, they dictate our lives according to their whims.

I will stay a slave to my passions for the rest of my life. I will be a willing slave to them, nonetheless. Tell your partner how much you love them.

I love Antonio with all my soul.


End file.
